


There Will Come a Family (They'll Heal You with Their Love)

by Des98



Series: The Adventures of Mini Zuko [4]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Found Family, Gaang as family, Gen, Team as Family, Well - Freeform, Whump, Zuko is an Awkward Turtleduck, borrowing gratuitously from muffinlance, katara and sokka do, that's also something i borrwed from muffin, the Gaang finds out how Zuko got his scar, we love you muffin, zuko likes seaprunes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-16
Updated: 2020-07-16
Packaged: 2021-03-05 02:13:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,078
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25316617
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Des98/pseuds/Des98
Summary: Zuko continues his physical recovery and starts his emotional one.
Relationships: Aang & Zuko (Avatar), Katara & Zuko (Avatar), Sokka & Zuko (Avatar), The Gaang & Zuko (Avatar), Toph Beifong & Zuko
Series: The Adventures of Mini Zuko [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1826704
Comments: 51
Kudos: 1431





	There Will Come a Family (They'll Heal You with Their Love)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [noodlebunny](https://archiveofourown.org/users/noodlebunny/gifts), [MuffinLance](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MuffinLance/gifts), [venomous_syfy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/venomous_syfy/gifts).



> Notes: the title can, should, and will be chanted to the tune of "Soldier, Poet, King" by the Oh Hellos

“I don’t need to be carried everywhere,” Zuko declared grumpily, but his point was undercut by the cough that tore its way out of his chest.

“Katara says you shouldn’t be exerting yourself much just yet; your body has enough to do trying to help you recover. As a fellow healer, I have to say I agree with her assessment,” Kustaa chided as he carried the swaddled bundle of blankets and furs with Zuko’s cranky face sticking out. “You’ve only been lucid for two days.” Honestly, he still wasn’t sure exactly how old the kid is. Katara said he was sixteen, and Zuko himself said he was sixteen, but Toph, who swore she could sense when a person was lying, was doing her damn best to convince the crew that he was only eight years old. She was succeeding pretty well. Honestly, going by Kustaa’s own judgment, the healer thought that he could _maybe_ buy him being twelve, but if anyone other than Katara, a master healer, had told him that the kid was sixteen, he would have laughed in their face. As it was, his dubious expression still conveyed his disbelief well enough even though he did not doubt Katara’s abilities or honesty. 

The blanket-bundle-child-of-an-indeterminate-age was doing his best to weakly squirm out of Kustaa’s grasp. What the kid would do if he succeeded, Kustaa had no idea, since he was wrapped up tightly and wouldn’t be able to use his arms or legs to break his fall.

Kustaa held him tighter. “You’re not getting out of my arms, you’re not walking to the mess hall, and you’re _certainly_ not being added to the watch tonight,” he scolded with an ease borne of years of dealing with Southern Water Tribe warriors, who made the most difficult patients he could have imagined. Well, until he met Zuko, that is.

“But I can help!” Zuko argued petulantly. “I know these waters, and I have experience with dealing with fire nation naval ships. I need to be useful!”

“You need to _rest,”_ Kustaa cut him off with a tone that brokered no argument. “You’re lucky Katara relented and allowed you to have lunch in the mess hall with the crew when you really should be in bed.”

“Been in bed for weeks,” Zuko grumbled.

“And you’ve been conscious for two days; that’s the bare minimum amount of days for it to even be plural,” Kustaa said in exasperation as he shifted the Zuko-bundle to one arm so he could open the door to the mess hall with the other hand. Zuko highly resented that he could be carried in one arm.

“They better have fire flakes,” Zuko huffed.

“No spicy food; it’ll hurt your throat.”

“Can’t catch a break,” Zuko definitely did not whine, because teenaged prince’s _didn’t_ whine. Kustaa was just glad he’d warmed up to him enough to not-whine instead of tense up like he was expecting to be hit at any second.

“We’ll get you some congee with sea prunes and smoked fish; doesn’t that sound nice? Put some meat back on your bones.”

“What’s a sea prune?” Zuko asked as they reached the table.

“Here.” Katara handed him a shrivelled-looking purple… vegetable? Sokka’s eyes were full of laughter, anticipating what he was sure would be the hilarious experience of watching Zuko spit a sea prune halfway across the room as if it had personally offended him.

Instead, his eyes widened. “This is good!” he gasped, looking somewhat surprised as he reached for another. Kustaa supposed he couldn’t blame him; they _did_ look pretty gross. But, as Zuko had just discovered, they tasted _great_ (the avatar might disagree, but the avatar had no clue what he was talking about) _._

“Wait, you actually _like_ them?” Sokka looked like he’d been robbed. 

“Why wouldn’t I?” Zuko asked, eagerly accepting the heap of them that Katara was piling on his plate. “I mean, they’d be better if they were spicy, but other than that I think they’re great.”

“Spicy sea prunes?” Sokka asked, his mind alight with the possibilities. “That’s… that’s actually really brilliant.”

Zuko shrugged around a mouthful of sea prunes. “We were pretty good innovators, before we started trying to kill everyone,” he said once he had swallowed.

“You need protein and carbs, too,” Kustaa scolded, pushing the pile of sea prunes aside to add a fillet of smoked fish and a steamed bun. Zuko gave his signature scowl and reluctantly moved his chopsticks over to pick up a bite of fish.

“Would you like some tea?” Aang asked, proffering the pot.

“Sure,” Zuko agreed. 

“Sugar or honey?” Katara asked as she held a cup out for Aang to pour.

Zuko looked at her as if she’d spouted another head.

“What is _wrong_ with you?” he asked. “You _never_ put sugar in black tea, and honey is only for herbals. A good tea can stand on its own two leaves.” He quoted one of Uncle’s favorite proverbs.

“O….kay…..” Katara tried to fill the awkward silence as Toph cackled.

He took a sip, spat, and coughed so violently that Katara jumped forward in a panic to ease the pressure in his lungs. Once he could breathe again, he made an absolutely _disgusted_ face at the teapot and attempted to disentangle himself from his blanket pile.

“Where are you going?” Aang asked, concerned.

“To the galley to show your chef how to make a proper cup of tea! This is just pathetic,” he declared imperiously as he continued to glare at their little metal teapot like it had personally offended him (looks like they were getting a show after all). Which, Sokka realized, it might very well have. Didn’t he and his uncle spend a few months working in a tea shop?

“Woah, whoah, whoah, easy there, Sunshine. You’re in no shape to go around screaming at our poor chef in the condition you’re in,” Toph scolded. “Your lungs sound like they’re trying to learn how to play the drums.”

She was obviously not intimidated by his fierce glower, but he made an attempt nonetheless. Toph cackled. His scar must be quite something, for people to look at it and not realize that the guy was about as intimidating as a baby turtleduck.

“Fine,” he groused eventually. “But we’re throwing this out.” He motioned towards the teapot with revulsion.

“I’ll do you one better,” Toph replied, smiling like a tigershark (seriously, that _had_ to be too many teeth for the mouth of a twelve-year-old, right?). The teapot gave a loud crunch and bent into a miniature statue of Toph.

“That was our only teapot,” Sokka sighed. 

“Sounds like a good thing to me,” Zuko huffed, picking up his chopsticks and picking up another sea prune while pointedly ignoring the other food that Kustaa had piled on his plate.

[]

A week later, and it was determined that Zuko was well enough for them to split off from the rest of the group if he _took it easy_ (and seriously, he had no idea _why_ Katara put so much emphasis on that bit). 

“The infection is gone, and the burn is mostly healed, but there’s nothing I can do about the scarring,” Katara told him apologetically as she pulled her healing water away, tossing it around a few times to remove the last traces of dried blood and pus that had been in the wound.

Zuko shrugged. “No big deal. Not the first scar Azula’s given me.”

Katara’s hands tightened into fists, and she forced herself to take a deep breath and save the anger for a later time, as Zuko was watching her warily out of the corner of his good eye. 

She exhaled slowly. “Well, I just can’t thank you enough for saving Aang. It means a lot to all of us. I can’t imagine how hard it was for you to leave behind everything you’d ever known to join us.”

“It might have been, once, but I’ve been doing a lot of thinking since the north pole when my father declared Uncle and I enemies of the state.” Zuko said this as if it wasn’t absolutely appalling.

“Zuko, that’s horrible!” Katara exclaimed, clutching her chest.

“Eh, I supposed I should have realized my father wanted me dead after he burned my face and told me not to come back home unless I captured the avatar. It’s my fault, really, for being so slow on the uptake.” 

Katara physically felt the breath leave her. She stumbled back a step and just managed to stay on her feet. “I… your father gave you that burn?”

Zuko looked at her, his head cocked in confusion. “My father gave me most of my burns, except the ones my sister gave me. You didn’t know?” He said this in the same flat tone that one might use to remark that water was wet.

“I… I just need a minute,” Katara said, struggling to catch her breath. “I’m not mad at you, don’t worry.” She reached down to pat his head fondly, if a bit awkwardly. Then she turned around and ran for the lower decks as quickly as she could.

Zuko blinked at her retreating back, bemused.

Sokka came up and sat down next to Zuko. “What’s her deal?” he asked, reaching over to carefully close Zuko’s tunic to cover his new scar.

“I don’t know,” Zuko readjusted his gaze towards Sokka, his milky blind eye staring blankly ahead as his right one gave Sokka its full attention. The intensity of the brilliant gold made Sokka feel minorly unsettled, not because it was filled with animosity, but because it wasn’t. It was sincere and honest and the emotions were laid out and as easy to read as words on a page. Sokka genuinely didn’t understand how anyone could have ever wanted to hurt him.

“All I did was tell her that my dad gave me this scar,” he pointed to his face and then down his burnt arm with his right hand, “and she freaked out and ran off. I don’t understand what I did.”

Sokka was glad he wasn’t drinking anything; as it was, he barely managed not to choke on air.

“Ahh,” he said, strangled. “I see.”

Zuko looked at him. “You’re doing it too,” he said.

“It’s just… that’s a little bit shocking, buddy, to find out that your dad burnt his own kid,” Sokka replied gently. Technically, he knew that Zuko was his age now, but he was still small and injured and confused, looking so out of his depth with the highly emotional situation that Sokka couldn’t help feeling protective.

“But he had the right to do it,” Zuko said, as if that was supposed to make Sokka feel _better._ “I spoke out against him in his war room, and then I refused to duel him, so he punished me. To teach me respect.”

“That’s fucked up,” Sokka sighed, running his hand through his hair. “And you _didn’t_ deserve that, no matter what you did. Parents are supposed to teach their kids, not hurt them.” 

“That was never my father’s way of doing things,” Zuko confided, as if it was any sort of revelation at all. 

Sokka gave a strangled chuckle. “Yeah, no kidding.”

“I’m worried about Azula,” Zuko continued, and Sokka looked at him in disbelief. This was the sister that just shot him full of lighting.

“She wasn’t always like that,” Zuko admitted. “And as long as I was around, father would punish me instead, because compared to me, she was always perfect. Now that I’m not there, I worry about what he might have done to her if he decided that perfect wasn’t good enough.”

“Well, she didn’t have a scar on her face, so there’s that.” Sokka wanted to kick himself immediately after he said it. He had such a good brain- why couldn’t he ever _use_ it before he said stupid things?

To his surprise, Zuko actually laughed. 

“Yeah,” he said. I guess there’s that.”

Sokka smiled and slung an arm around him, and gradually, Aang finished packing up Appa and came to join them. Toph didn’t like to be left out, so she wandered over as well. Finally, Katara came upstairs, her cheeks red from scrubbing all her tears away and her eyes red and puffy. She gave Zuko a watery smile and snuggled up next to him.

Zuko sat in the middle of a cuddle pile and felt something new beginning.


End file.
